Other major European economies such as Portugal, Spain, and Italy followed suit, adopting their versions of the metric system in the early 19th century. The main variation in the different versions was only seen in the naming of the units of measurement, with countries relying on respective traditional names for the units of measurement. Great Britain was the sole exception, and instead standardized its imperial system of measurement.
However, Britain later adopted the system after signing the Treaty of the Meter in The 20th century saw the spread of the metric system across the globe, with globalization being the main driving force behind the global spread. Until the day we rework the day into some measurement unit we will never be able to convert Time to a metric unit.
This old man still prefers to use non metric units. I cannot visualize metric units and must convert them to the measuring system that I grew up with before I know what the given measurements actually mean. I know that metric measures are useful and more precise, but they are of no use to me. I was a child during the push to switch over to Metric and I can say one of the biggest mistakes was why the emphasis on converting back and forth!
Fortunately, my time card in the military Metric is widely used and once I realized that if it is in Metric there's no need to convert! Also, I did a lot of traveling, abroad so the Metric System is natural to me. I use it whenever possible. I'm actually embarrassed that we are so slow with the changing, most people abroad look at us like we're idiots.
At least I know the younger generations are being taught Metric properly,and most agree we should be using it. It's past time, and it's mainly the baby boomer generation that refuse to adapt, to change. Nice try but the vast majority of Americans have no clue on metric. For example, they don't even know how far a kilometer is compared with a mile. Interestingly, the British still officially use miles for road signs.
Stones and pounds for a person's weight, and feet and inches for a person's height, are only used in everyday parlance among older generations. Although Canada adopted SI on April 1, to some hatdcore Canadians this was indeed a joke we still use Imperial measures widely, in fact exclusively in construction and plumbing. In western Canada temperatures are still announced in F and C in medias. Elders tend to state distances in miles although our maps and traffic signs are exclusively metric.
Yes, the myth that US does not use metric system is really stupid. But this is still true that only US, Liberia and Myanmar in the whole world use only or mostly imperial system.
And the fact that US was one of the original countries to sign the Metre Convention, only makes it look worse. Yanno, the real question I have is why does anyone care? If it is such an inconvenience, feel free to live somewhere else.
Literally, almost anywhere else Using the current customs of the rest of the world as some sort of guiding principal is as logically empty as admonishing a holdout for refusing to use leeches for headaches in the dark ages.
Lets be honest, even many of the SI units are fundamentally meaningless. How many times has the Meter changed? The gram? Lets look no further than a article from Physics World:. The changes will now come into force on 20 May The point is, enough is enough. The condescending stream of preaching about the United State's refusal to adopt the metric system has grown dull. You want to know why the US doesn't use the metric system? Its arbitrary, just like the Imperial system. The metric system has at least given us a framework for how to base an entire measurement system off of a pointless, arbitrary creation like the meter.
Now lets build one that is actually universal. Dare I say one that is based off of something substantial, apparently universal, and easily attainable, like the hydrogen atom? Then perhaps the electron? At least it would be something fundamental to the cosmos, as opposed to some arbitrary construct which has had to be redefined half a dozen times in the last years.
Make a meaningful system with true foresight and longevity, we will gladly change. Continue to argue for swapping out one arbitrary system for another simply because "everyone is doing it" and its easier to multiply? Moving on Oh, and since base 12 mathematics are apparently too hard for anyone outside of the U. I would hate to make anyone resort to using elementary school multiplication after all. No, the lenght didn't change, only the definitions and protocoles were improved for additional rigour.
Seriously, in the era of micro-processors and nanotechnologies, do you really think it's still consistent to use primitive measures as the finger of someone, its foot or a random stone? There is a lenght unit now carrefully defined and based on the most precise way humanity was able for the metre speed of light and one for the mass based on water at sea level of a cubic tenth of that lenght, the whole metric system is named by comprehensive terms and logically dividable with the base the world decided to use whether 12 might have been better without having to do multiple conversions and used everywhere.
Long story short, imperial is not compatible even with itself. If you're happy with that, good for you but I and many others want better than mediocrity for our country! The US is already metric; and will eventually become fully metric. The problem is that it is not happening fast enough. NIST needs to push harder. The new generations are not recalcitrant like previous generations, and will indeed accept the new system. We just need to educate.
The meter is an arbitrary unit of measure that is subdivided by the number of digits on our hands. There is nothing 'better' about that. If we had three fingers and a thumb, then you would be talking about how wonderful the base-8 system is and, you know what, it WOULD be better than base because there would be no rounding errors in computer programs.
The worse excuse I've ever heard from an engineer, who should have known better, was to talk about how we should go metric because computers use it. Computers are constantly having to convert as best as they can from base-2 to base In the English system, you use base-2 because it is practical.
YES, fractional inches are in base-2, the most efficient system possible - the reason computers use it! It would be nonsense to go through the trouble of trying to make base "bits" because WE have 10 digits, computers should, too??
Using base-2, you only have the sizes that are practical as size increases. You can see this most easily in a mechanic's toolbox. In the range of normally encountered automotive sockets, I have 15 English sockets and 24 Metric sockets. That's what happens when you use an arbitrary base system. On a private level, I tried years ago to go to the Meter. It was terrible. When you are using the inch, you subdivide by base-2 units i. You want to place a screw in the center of an inch-based board?
Divide by 2. When I wanted to place a screw at the center of cm based board, I had to go to mm to divide by 2! I also have to say something about the commentor who claimed that time is in the metric system: Were you even serious? Time units, from day to second, are Base24, Base60, Base The same goes for circular measure, there are degrees because it is so practical. Try metric on that. I think that I might have missed your point, but even if we measure with fractional inches in base2, we are still using the numeric system in base Did you mean to criticize the metric system or the usage of a numeric system in base10?
Because the former is just a consequence to the latter. Of course there would be no point of a decimal metric system if we used a base 8 system. I grew up in Europe with the metric system and only used imperial units for floppy disks and monitor sizes. Everything else is metric. Moved to the USA as an adult and after an adjustment period I like the imperial system a lot better. The reasons are much in line with Mr Michael Gorsich above. When you have a base 12 or 16 it is much easier to calculate fractions.
Look at the number of wrenches and the number of different threads in the metric system. Compare to the SAE standards. The SAE standards are much more practical. The imperial measurement system is comprised of units that everyday people found useful for their everyday use. The French metric system is comprised of units scientists in a lab decided on and forced everybody else to use. In the crowdsourcing model there are a number of different ideas. Since it is impracticable for everybody to use different solutions, there is a natural selection and only the most popular ideas prevail.
You can see this in the imperial system - there were originally a lot more units of measurement, most of which have been deprecated. In the central planning model there is one decisionmaker, which can be a single person or a committee, and everybody else will be forced to "agree to disagree".
The central planning method often comes up with higher levels of organization, elegancy, consistency. The crowdsourcing model often has more taylored solutions, moe choices, but more chaotic. Think of "master-planned" neighborhoods vs an old country lane. Think of communism vs free enterprise. It is no surprise that a government agency would favor control.
But it's not just the government. Most people these days favor control over freedom. That's why we have things like HomeOwners Associations. The line of longitude used to determine the length of the metre runs through the centre of the Paris Observatory Credit: Madhvi Ramani. As Dr Alder details in his book, measuring this meridian arc during a time of great political and social upheaval proved to be an epic undertaking. The two astronomers were frequently met with suspicion and animosity; they fell in and out of favour with the state; and were even injured on the job, which involved climbing to high points such as the tops of churches.
The Pantheon, which was originally commissioned by Louis XV to be a church, became the central geodetic station in Paris from whose dome Delambre triangulated all the points around the city. But despite all the technical mastery and labour that had gone into defining the new measurement, nobody wanted to use it. People were reluctant to give up the old ways of measuring since these were inextricably bound with local rituals, customs and economies. For example, an ell, a measure of cloth, generally equalled the width of local looms, while arable land was often measured in days, referencing the amount of land that a peasant could work during this time.
Eventually, in , Napoleon abandoned the metric system; although it was still taught in school, he largely let people use whichever measures they liked until it was reinstated in This was not just due to perseverance on the part of the state. Of course, it was tricky to do this unless you had clear, standard measures, such as the metre and the kilogram. Originally established to preserve international standards, the BIPM promotes the uniformity of seven international units of measurement: the metre, the kilogram, the second, the ampere, the kelvin, the mole and the candela.
It is the home of the master platinum standard metre bar that was used to carefully calibrate copies, which were then sent out to various other national capitals. In the s, the BIPM redefined the metre in terms of light, making it more precise than ever.
And now, defined by universal laws of physics, it was finally a measure truly based on nature. The small, cylindrical weight cast in platinum-iridium alloy is also, like the metre, due to be redefined in terms of nature — specifically the quantum-mechanical quantity known as the Planck constant — by the BIPM this November. As he explained the principle of the Kibble balance and the way in which a mass is weighed against the force of a coil in a magnetic field, I marvelled at the latest scientific engineering before me, the precision and personal effort of all the people who have been working on the kilogram project since it began in and are now very close to achieving their goal.
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